President Donald Trump has insisted that Iran “cannot have a nuclear weapon” as strikes have spread across the Middle East.
The US leader appeared to backtrack from an earlier threat of massive strikes and said that discussions had been going “well”.
“They are talking to us right now. They'd love to make a deal. I don't think they're ready to. I don't think it's time yet, but I'm willing to listen,” he said in remarks at the White House on Friday.
"But they cannot have a nuclear weapon. We don't want to see Washington DC, or any of our cities, or Israel, or frankly the Middle East, destroyed with a nuclear weapons, because I know the power of nuclear weapons.”
Conflict has spread across the Middle East as Yemen’s Houthi rebel group and Saudi Arabia exchanged strikes overnight.
The Houthis claimed responsibility for an attack on the southern Saudi city of Jizan after targets in the Yemeni port city of Hodeida and a nearby island were hit by Saudi on Friday.
Accusing Riyadh of a “dangerous escalation”, they had warned the attacks would not go “unanswered”.
The Houthis have threatened a maritime blockade in the Red Sea, impacting Saudi shipping.
Key Points
- Houthis and Saudi Arabia exchange strikes as conflict spreads
- Trump insists Iran 'cannot have a nuclear weapon' as he insists talks are going 'well'
- Iran accuses EU of 'hypocrisy' over war
- Trump says Iran is 'most serious' yet in discussions
Iran war spreads to Red Sea and Caspian but Gulf quiet as US forgoes strikes
05:15 , Namita Singh
The Iran war broadened over the weekend despite a pause in US strikes, as Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthis attacked Saudi oil installations along the Red Sea coast and Iran accused Ukraine of targeting one of its vessels in the Caspian Sea.
The US military said its naval blockade against Iran "remains in full effect" but did not explain why it halted a streak of 13 nights of escalating strikes.
There were also no weekend reports of attacks by Iran on neighbours, similar to its daily rejoinders to the US attacks.
Asked about the pause, a senior official in president Donald Trump's administration said Trump "has always been clear that his preference is diplomacy, but he has shown Iran what will happen if they fail to come to the table in a serious way".
Trump has decided, for now, to back away from plans to ramp up attacks on Iran, the New York Times said on Saturday, citing two people briefed on the discussion.
Trump went on expletive-laden rant against ‘scumbags’ in Iran as his frustration with war mounts: report
03:00 , Rebecca Whittaker
President Donald Trump unleashed an expletive-filled rant against Iran’s leaders as he appears to be increasingly frustrated with the lack of progress in the war he started earlier this year, according to a report.
During a recent Oval Office meeting, the president called the Iranian leaders “scumbags” and “lunatics,” a person who overheard the remarks told The Wall Street Journal.
Roughly five months into the U.S.-Iran conflict, there has been limited progress on a peace deal, which has seen lengthy negotiations between the two sides.
Read more here:
Trump went on expletive-ladden rant against Iran amid frustration with war: report
Watch: Trump inflates Vietnam war dead number by 142,000 as he defends Iran deaths
02:00 , Rebecca Whittaker
Experts warn the real pinch from the Iran war is about to strike
01:00 , Rebecca Whittaker
US gas prices will continue climbing for weeks — and maybe months — due to the resumption of President Donald Trump’s war against Iran, experts warn.
Patrick DeHaan, petroleum analyst for GasBuddy, said Friday on social media that while oil prices were “taking a breather for today” after recently surging by $20 a barrel, he’s still expecting the national average cost of a gallon of gas to soon reach $4.20 to $4.30.
Read more here:
Experts warn the real pinch from the Iran war is about to strike
Watch: Trump says Iran war 'going extremely well' but warns regime has 'evil intentions'
00:00 , Rebecca Whittaker
Pictured: Protesters in Seoul denouncing the US attacks on Iran
23:00 , Rebecca Whittaker
Recap: Houthis fire missiles and drones at Saudi Arabia in response to strikes on a Yemeni city
22:00 , Rebecca Whittaker
Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels said that they fired missiles and drones at Saudi Arabia in response to Saudi airstrikes on the strategic Red Sea city of Hodeida, in another escalation over vital shipping routes in the Middle East while the United States and Iran vie for control of the Strait of Hormuz.
The Yemeni Armed Forces (YAF) spokesperson, Brigadier General Yahya Saree said in a prerecorded statement that the attack targeted facilities in the Red Sea cities of Yanbu and Jizan that belong to Aramco, the world’s largest oil company.
Saudi Arabia's civil defense said alerts sounded multiple times early Saturday in both cities, but the Kingdom hasn't commented further.
Watch: Rubio says Iran suffering in US strikes despite ‘stupid Lego videos’
21:00 , Rebecca Whittaker
Houthis fire missiles and drones at Saudi Arabia in response to strikes on a Yemeni city
20:30 , Rebecca Whittaker
Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels said Saturday that they fired missiles and drones at Saudi Arabia in response to Saudi airstrikes on the strategic Red Sea city of Hodeida, in another escalation over vital shipping routes in the Middle East while the United States and Iran vie for control of the Strait of Hormuz.
Read more here:
Houthis fire missiles and drones at Saudi Arabia in response to strikes on a Yemeni city
Who are the Houthis? How rebel group could disrupt global trade amid Strait of Hormuz chaos
20:00 , Rebecca Whittaker
The Yemeni rebel group was formed in the 1990s as a political-religious Shia movement orchestrating a series of guerrilla wars against Yemen’s national army.
They currently control significant parts of northwestern Yemen, including its capital Sana’a, after seizing it following the country’s 2014 civil war when they forced the government to step down.
A Saudi-led, western-backed coalition took over, which the Houthis have spent years fighting with the assistance of Iran, before a UN-brokered deal in 2022. A Saudi and UAE bombing campaign against Houthi targets was launched in 2015 and drew criticism over civilian deaths, leading to calls for the UK to cease arms exports to Saudi Arabia.
Watch: US military says it completed 13th night of strikes against Iran
19:30 , Rebecca Whittaker
Trump claimed dead US soldiers spoke of stopping an Iranian nuclear bomb. Widow says her husband just wanted to come home
19:00 , Rebecca Whittaker
The widow of one of the four U.S. soldiers killed in the Middle East amid the recent escalation in the Iran war has told how her husband longed to return home to be with his family as the Iraqi base where he was stationed came under heavy bombardment.
Sgt. Michael Emmanuel Swinton, 30, was killed on July 19 at the Erbil Air Base in northern Iraq during a controlled detonation of an Iranian drone, the Defense Department said, leaving behind his wife Jamiah Swinton and their four-year-old daughter.
President Donald Trump, whose bombing campaign began on February 28 and has so far claimed the lives of 18 U.S. service members, said Wednesday that the fallen soldiers shared his view that Iran cannot be allowed to develop a nuclear weapon.
Read more here:
Widow of US soldier killed in Iran says her husband just wanted to come home
Pictured: Anti-war demonstration outside the main gate of RAF Fairford airbase
18:30 , Rebecca Whittaker
An anti-war demonstration took place at RAF Fairford on Saturday following a US airstrike on Iran carried out by a B-1 bomber allegedly stationed at the base.
Recap: Iran accuses EU of 'hypocrisy' over war
18:00 , Rebecca Whittaker
Iran’s foreign ministry spokesperson has hit out at the European Union’s Kaja Kallas after she expressed concerns about human rights in the country.
On Saturday, Esmail Baghaei, wrote in a post on X: “Kaja Kalals speaks of the European Union’s ‘human rights concerns’ regarding Iran.
“How can a professed commitment to human rights be so easily reconciled with providing logistical and technical support for lethal aggressions against the Iranian people — aggressions that deliberately target civilians and critical national infrastructure?
“All while refusing to condemn even the most blatant war crimes, and offering not a single word of sympathy for Iranian children slaughtered by American-Israeli bombs and missiles enabled by the EU’s own ‘logistical and technical support.’
“This is not merely a loss of credibility. It is the banality of evil — and the purest form of hypocrisy.”
The US and Israel deny committing war crimes.
.@Kajakallas speaks of the European Union’s “human rights concerns” regarding Iran. How can a professed commitment to human rights be so easily reconciled with providing logistical and technical support for lethal aggressions against the Iranian people — aggressions that…
— Esmaeil Baqaei (@IRIMFA_SPOX) July 25, 2026
US gradually expands the scope of its attacks on Iran
17:30 , Rebecca Whittaker
The United States has gradually expanded the scope of its attacks against Iran over the course of two weeks of punishing airstrikes that increasingly resemble the war’s opening salvos.
After a brief ceasefire in June following the signing of an interim deal to end the conflict, a battle for control over the Strait of Hormuz erupted, shattering the truce and pushing the countries back to the precipice of an all-out war across the Middle East.
Read more here:
US gradually expands the scope of its attacks on Iran
Watch: Trump says he takes Russia's Putin and China's Xi at their word over aiding Iran
17:00 , Rebecca Whittaker
Houthis fire missiles and drones at Saudi Arabia in response to strikes on a Yemeni city
16:30 , Rebecca Whittaker
Yemen’s Iran-backed Houthi rebels said that they fired missiles and drones at Saudi Arabia in response to Saudi airstrikes on the strategic Red Sea city of Hodeida, in another escalation over vital shipping routes in the Middle East while the United States and Iran vie for control of the Strait of Hormuz.
The Yemeni Armed Forces (YAF) spokesperson, Brigadier General Yahya Saree said in a prerecorded statement that the attack targeted facilities in the Red Sea cities of Yanbu and Jizan that belong to Aramco, the world’s largest oil company.
Saudi Arabia's civil defense said alerts sounded multiple times early Saturday in both cities, but the Kingdom hasn't commented further.
The 'rockets and feathers' effect: Inflation eases but grocery bills do not
16:00 , Maira Butt
Economics has a term for what U.S. grocery prices have done in recent years: rockets and feathers.
Rockets, because the cost of food eaten at home zoomed up in the aftermath of the pandemic. Feathers, because once prices rise, they’re slow to come down.
That’s been frustrating for Americans hit with the sharpest increase in grocery prices in 50 years. While food price inflation peaked in 2022, when prices jumped 11.4%, prices have not reversed course. An acceleration inflation after the U.S. and Israel attacked Iran has prolonged the aggravation.
The 'rockets and feathers' effect: Inflation eases but grocery bills do not
The four Iranian nuclear plants in Trump’s sights after president’s threat to hit Pickaxe Mountain
15:30 , Maira Butt
With the US-Iran ceasefire in tatters, Donald Trump has issued new threats against Tehran’s nuclear facilities in what would represent a significant escalation in the conflict.
The president’s latest target is Kuh-e Kolang Gaz La, or “Pickaxe Mountain,” a suspected underground facility that lies on the south side of Iran's Natanz nuclear enrichment site, one of those bombed by the US and Israel in June 2025.
Named Operation Midnight Hammer, the countries launched a series of attacks on several nuclear and military facilities more than one year ago. as part of a long-running ambition to thwart Tehran’s nuclear weapons programme.
The Iranian nuclear plants in Trump’s sights after threat to Pickaxe Mountain
Iran trolls ‘Little Marco’ with Lego clip after Rubio claims he’s never seen ‘their stupid videos’
15:01 , Maira Butt
Iran has trolled U.S. secretary of state Marco Rubio after he hit out at the “stupid Lego videos” that have spoofed the war on social media.
Speaking to reporters on Thursday, Rubio acknowledged the viral clips – while he insisting he had never seen them – when he was asked about the current state of negotiations with Iran.
“They’re probably not ready to do a deal yet, but they will be soon because the price they’re paying is very high despite their tough talk and their flowery language and their stupid Lego videos they put out – I’ve never seen them, but they put these things out on social media,” he said.
“Despite all that bravado, they are suffering tremendously, and they’re going to suffer more until they come to their senses.”
Iran trolls Rubio with Lego clip after claiming he’s never seen the ‘stupid videos’
Watch: Trump inflates Vietnam war dead number by 142,000 as he defends Iran deaths
14:30 , Maira Butt
Trump White House had four killed soldiers taken off Pentagon’s list of Iran war dead, sparking backlash: report
14:00 , Maira Butt
In the last two days, the Pentagon reportedly reduced the announced U.S. service member death toll in the Iran war from 18 to 14.
Three military officials told The New York Times that the revision was in part because the most recent four deaths — three in Jordan and one in Iraq — came after President Trump declared an initial ceasefire in April.
“The administration seems to have a real hard time being honest about what is going on — not just about casualties, but about the whole war in general,” retired Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, who served in the first Trump administration, told the paper.
Trump officials had four killed soldiers taken off Iran war death list: report
Mapped: Yemeni rebel Houthis threaten maritime blockade on Saudi Arabia
13:30 , Maira Butt
Trump says ‘I trust’ Putin and Xi — contradicting Hegseth about Iran war allies
13:00 , Maira Butt
President Donald Trump on Friday said he does not believe the Russian or Chinese governments are providing military or intelligence assistance to Iran — based solely on the denials of their leaders — contradicting the assessment of his own defense secretary during a Senate hearing just days ago.
Taking questions in the Oval Office during an appearance focused on nuclear energy, Trump was asked to defend a Truth Social post in which he claimed Chinese President Xi Jinping had said “he would not, under any circumstances, give or sell Weapons to the Islamic Republic of Iran” and said Russia’s Vladimir Putin had promised, “he would not sell Weapons to Iran.”
He also wrote that in his view, both countries were “not participating” in Iran’s ongoing conflict with the U.S. while warning that “it would be very bad for them” if they did.
Trump says ‘I trust’ Putin and Xi — contradicting Hegseth about Iran war allies
Who are the Houthis? How rebel group could disrupt global trade amid Strait of Hormuz chaos
12:30 , Maira Butt
The Yemeni rebel group was formed in the 1990s as a political-religious Shia movement orchestrating a series of guerrilla wars against Yemen’s national army.
They currently control significant parts of northwestern Yemen, including its capital Sana’a, after seizing it following the country’s 2014 civil war when they forced the government to step down.
A Saudi-led, western-backed coalition took over, which the Houthis have spent years fighting with the assistance of Iran, before a UN-brokered deal in 2022. A Saudi and UAE bombing campaign against Houthi targets was launched in 2015 and drew criticism over civilian deaths, leading to calls for the UK to cease arms exports to Saudi Arabia.
Trump claimed dead US soldiers spoke of stopping an Iranian nuclear bomb. Widow says her husband just wanted to come home
12:00 , Maira Butt
The widow of one of the four U.S. soldiers killed in the Middle East amid the recent escalation in the Iran war has told how her husband longed to return home to be with his family as the Iraqi base where he was stationed came under heavy bombardment.
Sgt. Michael Emmanuel Swinton, 30, was killed on July 19 at the Erbil Air Base in northern Iraq during a controlled detonation of an Iranian drone, the Defense Department said, leaving behind his wife Jamiah Swinton and their four-year-old daughter.
President Donald Trump, whose bombing campaign began on February 28 and has so far claimed the lives of 18 U.S. service members, said Wednesday that the fallen soldiers shared his view that Iran cannot be allowed to develop a nuclear weapon.
But his heartbroken widow would not be drawn on that notion in an interview with The New York Times, and instead painted a picture of a devoted husband and father who just wanted to be reunited with his family in Spring Lake, North Carolina.
Widow of US soldier killed in Iran says her husband just wanted to come home
US gradually expands the scope of its attacks on Iran
11:30 , Maira Butt
The United States has gradually expanded the scope of its attacks against Iran over the course of two weeks of punishing airstrikes that increasingly resemble the war’s opening salvos.
After a brief ceasefire in June following the signing of an interim deal to end the conflict, a battle for control over the Strait of Hormuz erupted, shattering the truce and pushing the countries back to the precipice of an all-out war across the Middle East.
The US started off with intense waves of strikes on Iran’s navy and coastal defences earlier this month, aiming to blunt Tehran's ability to attack ships in the strait vital to world energy supplies. In recent days, the US has expanded its targets, hitting bridges and infrastructure in the south and striking deeper into the centre of Iran and the outskirts of its capital, Tehran.
US gradually expands the scope of its attacks on Iran
Greek-operated air defence system shoots down missiles over Saudi
10:55 , Maira Butt
An air defence system operated by Greek military personnel in Saudi Arabia intercepted two ballistic missiles launched from Yemen on Saturday targeting oil refineries in Yanbu, Greek security sources told Reuters.
Incident involving tanker and military forces reported in Gulf of Oman, UKMTO says
10:22 , Maira Butt
A tanker was involved in an encounter with military forces in the Gulf of Oman on Friday, the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations agency said on Saturday.
UKMTO advised vessels to consult the latest maritime security information and remain alert to the evolving operational environment.
Experts warn the real pinch from the Iran war is about to strike
09:58 , Maira Butt
U.S. gas prices will continue climbing for weeks — and maybe months — due to the resumption of President Donald Trump’s war against Iran, experts warn.
Patrick DeHaan, petroleum analyst for GasBuddy, said Friday on social media that while oil prices were “taking a breather for today” after recently surging by $20 a barrel, he’s still expecting the national average cost of a gallon of gas to soon reach $4.20 to $4.30.
Shon Hiatt, director of the University of Southern California’s Zage Business of Energy Initiative, said oil markets apparently assumed that political pressure would force Trump to quickly end the war he launched without congressional authorization on February 28.
Experts warn the real pinch from the Iran war is about to strike
WATCH: Trump says Iran war 'going extremely well' but warns regime has 'evil intentions'
09:30 , Rachel Dobkin
FULL STORY: Trump went on expletive-laden rant against ‘scumbags’ in Iran as his frustration with war mounts: report
09:00 , Ariana Baio
US President Donald Trump unleashed an expletive-filled rant against Iran’s leaders as he appears to be increasingly frustrated with the lack of progress in the war he started earlier this year, according to a report.
During a recent Oval Office meeting, the president called the Iranian leaders “scumbags” and “lunatics,” a person who overheard the remarks told The Wall Street Journal.
Roughly five months into the US-Iran conflict, there has been limited progress on a peace deal, which has seen lengthy negotiations between the two sides.
A senior administration official told the Wall Street Journal that Trump was losing patience and sees few good options besides continuing military strikes, which resumed earlier this month after a ceasefire fell apart.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement that Iran broke a memorandum of understanding with the United States by shooting at commercial ships and killing American soldiers.
Read on...
Trump went on expletive-ladden rant against Iran amid frustration with war: report
Fired military officials claim they were ousted by Pete Hegseth for questioning orders
08:40 , Joe Sommerlad
Two former US military officers have accused the country’s Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth of firing them for questioning his orders, according to a report.
The officers, who spoke to MS NOW anonymously for fear of reprisals from the Pentagon, said Hegseth had effectively forced them to retire early after interpreting their raising issues about his directives as insubordination.
The secretary “is intimidated by people who have real warfighting background and don’t just talk about the warrior ethos”, one of the officers claimed. “I think he just can’t stand people around who will call him on his bulls***”.
They argued that if Hegseth were serious about encouraging “warfighters”, as he has frequently claimed, he would not have removed Gen. Christopher Donahue, the top Army commander for Europe and Africa, from his post.
A spokesperson for the Pentagon denied the claims, branding them “completely false”.
Read on...
Military officers claim they were fired by Hegseth for questioning orders
Iran accuses EU of 'hypocrisy' over war
08:20 , Maira Butt
Iran’s foreign ministry spokesperson has hit out at the European Union’s Kaja Kallas after she expressed concerns about human rights in the country.
On Saturday, Esmail Baghaei, wrote in a post on X: “Kaja Kalals speaks of the European Union’s ‘human rights concerns’ regarding Iran.
“How can a professed commitment to human rights be so easily reconciled with providing logistical and technical support for lethal aggressions against the Iranian people — aggressions that deliberately target civilians and critical national infrastructure?
“All while refusing to condemn even the most blatant war crimes, and offering not a single word of sympathy for Iranian children slaughtered by American-Israeli bombs and missiles enabled by the EU’s own ‘logistical and technical support.’
“This is not merely a loss of credibility. It is the banality of evil — and the purest form of hypocrisy.”
The US and Israel deny committing war crimes.
Trump says Iran is 'most serious' yet in discussions
08:00 , Maira Butt
President Donald Trump said that Iran is now far “more serious” in discussions than it has been in the conflict so far.
“I think they are being by far the most serious that we’ve seen,” he said on Friday. “But that doesn’t mean we get there.”
He added: “They are talking to us right now. They'd love to make a deal. I don't think they're ready to. I don't think it's time yet, but I'm willing to listen.”
Trump insists Iran 'cannot have a nuclear weapon' as he insists talks are going 'well'
07:40 , Maira Butt
President Donald Trump has insisted that Iran “cannot have a nuclear weapon” in comments made during the White House Correspondents’ dinner on Friday.
He also said that talks between the countries had been going “well” as he seemingly backtracked from the “massive” strikes he had earlier threatened.
“They are talking to us right now. They'd love to make a deal. I don't think they're ready to. I don't think it's time yet, but I'm willing to listen.
"But they cannot have a nuclear weapon. We don't want to see Washington DC, or any of our cities, or Israel, or frankly the Middle East, destroyed with a nuclear weapons, because I know the power of nuclear weapons.
“I see it. I get to see it. We're not going to let that happen. So this is all about we will not let them have a nuclear weapon. And they would use it. They would use if they had it.”
Houthis and Saudi Arabia exchange strikes as conflict spreads
07:17 , Maira Butt
Saudi Arabia has Yemen’s Houthi rebel group has claimed responsibility for an attack on Saudi Arabia on Saturday.
The missile attack on the southern Saudi city of Jizan came after days of escalating tensions, in which they vowed retaliation against the country for attacking its military targets on Friday.
Accusing Riyadh of a “dangerous escalation”, it said its attacks would not go “unanswered”.
The Houthis had been threatening a maritime blockade in the Red Sea, impacting Saudi shipping.
“The terrorist Houthi military … targeted commercial ships in the Red Sea,” Turki al-Maliki, the Saudi-led coalition’s spokesperson, said on X, adding that after carrying out attacks on the Houthi targets the “military response is now over”.
The attacks hit Houthi targets in the Yemeni port city of Hodeida and a nearby island on Friday.
US warns citizens in mideast to exercise caution
06:45 , Namita Singh
The Iranian army said it had attacked US military equipment depots at Al-Adiri, officially named Camp Buehring, in northern Kuwait, and the positions of US troops at Camp Arifjan and at Camp Doha, near Kuwait City.
In the early evening, Kuwait said its air defences were intercepting "hostile" targets launched from Iran. Iran's Revolutionary Guards said they had significantly damaged a surveillance tower used by the US Fifth Fleet in Bahrain.
Tankers rerouting, shipping insurance rises
06:30 , Namita Singh
The Houthi attacks forced several other tankers to turn around and head north through the Suez Canal, which would be a much longer route to Asia, by sailing around Africa.
Still, half of the 18 ships exiting Bab el-Mandeb on Thursday were carrying crude oil, including two Chinese supertankers, while the number of tankers crossing through the Strait of Hormuz fell to just one, the lowest since 7 May.
Pakistan exploring path for talks, sources say
06:15 , Namita Singh
Brent futures stood down more than $4 at a little over $96 on Friday, after the previous day's attack on the Saudi tankers in the Red Sea's Bab el-Mandeb strait boosted oil prices 7 per cent to $100 per barrel for the first time since May.
Sources said Pakistan was exploring a path towards resuming stalled talks between the US and Iran to end the war, after China initiated a push.
Exploratory discussions took place during a visit by Iran's interior minister Eskandar Momeni to Islamabad this week — his second in the last 10 days, three Pakistani sources said.
WATCH: Trump says he takes Russia's Putin and China's Xi at their word over aiding Iran
06:03 , Rachel Dobkin
Iran threatens US forces
05:45 , Namita Singh
The US military launched air strikes on Iran late on Thursday and early on Friday, racking up 13 consecutive nights of attacks.
In a statement on X, the Iranian health ministry said 59 people had been killed and 666 wounded since the resumption of clashes with US forces in late June. Iranian media cited the head of Iran's top joint military command as saying Iran would kill a member of the US forces for every Iranian killed.
The war has killed 18 US service members. The Pentagon has said 100 service members had been injured since 7 July. Officials have told Reuters that more than 500 US troops have been injured so far.
US missiles hit Iran as path towards de-escalation uncertain
05:30 , Namita Singh
US missiles struck targets across Iran on Friday and president Donald Trump vowed "major military punishment" for Tehran and its Houthi allies in Yemen, though he once again left open the door to a diplomatic deal with Iran.
Two weeks after the collapse of an interim truce meant to end the war, Iranian armed forces responded by firing at US bases in neighbouring Arab countries and warning that they could strike non-military buildings there used by US personnel.
Trump has threatened in recent days to widen targets to Iran's energy plants and bridges, send ground forces to seize its oil hub of Kharg Island, and bomb a deep-underground nuclear-linked site known as Pickaxe Mountain.
On Friday, he said he had not yet made a decision on new major strikes, however. "We are talking to them," Trump told reporters at the White House.
"I think they're being serious. I think ... they are being by far the most serious that we've seen them, but that doesn't mean we get there."
Asked what the exit strategy was for the Iran war, Trump said, "There's a military exit where we just keep going just the way we are, and we can even make it a heavier dose, and it's knocking out everything they have. Or there's a smarter strategy that you make a deal." But he added, "We're locked and loaded. We're ready to go."
Trump official’s announcement of nuclear deal with Saudi caused panic inside White House: report
05:06 , Brendan Rascius
The US Energy Department’s announcement of a civilian nuclear agreement with Saudi Arabia triggered confusion and anger inside the White House, prompting a last-minute stipulation that has cast uncertainty over the deal’s future, according to a new report.
The agreement, years in the making, would allow Saudi Arabia to build nuclear reactors using US technology. Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Saudi Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman signed it in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday alongside a bilateral safeguards agreement.
“Together, these two agreements lay the legal foundation for a decades-long, multi-billion-dollar partnership that advances several priority economic and strategic objectives, including nuclear nonproliferation”, the Energy Department said in a news release.
However, US President Donald Trump was unaware the deal was being announced, leading him and other staffers to become “livid”, according to CNN, which cited sources familiar with the matter.
Read on...
Saudi Arabia nuclear deal announcement caused panic in the White House: report
Trump White House had four killed soldiers taken off Pentagon’s list of Iran war dead, sparking backlash: report
04:34 , Josh Marcus
In the last two days, the Pentagon reportedly reduced the announced US service member death toll in the Iran war from 18 to 14.
Three military officials told The New York Times that the revision was in part because the most recent four deaths — three in Jordan and one in Iraq — came after US President Trump declared an initial ceasefire in April.
“The administration seems to have a real hard time being honest about what is going on — not just about casualties, but about the whole war in general”, retired Lt. Gen. Ben Hodges, who served in the first Trump administration, told the newspaper.
In a post Thursday on X, Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell called suggestions of an intentional reduction “one of the worst instances of the Fake News media manufacturing lies out of thin air for absolutely no reason at all but to cause distress among the American people”.
“The site errors on the Defense Casualty Analysis System (DCAS) were due to a temporary data disruption”, he added.
Read on...
Pentagon reduced death count from Iran war to match Trump timeline: report
Saudi civil defence issues emergency alert for Yanbu governorate
04:20 , Namita Singh
Saudi Civil Defence said an alert had been issued through the National Early Warning Platform for Emergencies in Yanbu Governorate to warn residents of a potential danger.
The danger has passed in Yanbu governorate, Saudi Civil Defence added.The statement did not immediately provide further details on the nature of the threat.
Trump flew on old Air Force One after credible threat from Iranian proxies: report
04:01 , Rachel Dobkin
Donald Trump flew on the old Air Force One instead of the luxury Qatari-gifted jet while returning from the NATO summit in Turkey earlier this month after what was believed to be a credible threat to the US president from Iranian proxies, The New York Times reported, citing people briefed on the matter.
When asked at the time about a potential security concern that could have caused the switch, the US president denied there was a specific threat, but said, “I have a threat all the time”.
The Independent has reached out to the White House for comment.
Widow of soldier reportedly removed from Iran war casualty count speaks out
03:36 , Rachel Dobkin
The widow of one of the four soldiers reportedly removed from the Pentagon’s official Iran war casualty count has spoken out.
Jamiah Gonzalez-Swinton, the wife of Sgt. Michael Swinton, who was killed in an attack at Erbil Air Base in Iraq on Sunday, was left almost speechless when asked about the incident that the Pentagon described as a glitch.
“Has anyone spoken to you about this?” CNN’s Erin Burnett asked Gonzalez-Swinton.
“Nobody has reached out yet. I kind of don't have words for that”, the widow replied.
